Lucky to be mentored by Lee Weatherly

At the end of 2015, I was accepted onto the WoMentoring project by the hugely talented and lovely Lee Weatherly, bestselling author of Broken Sky and the Angel trilogy.

Lee is an impressive author (with more than 50 books for children to her name) and has literally written the book on writing: Write a Blockbuster – And Get it Published, co-authored with Helen Corner.

So I was thrilled when Lee agreed to take me on and said lots of positive things about my manuscript. But – and there was a big BUT – she felt I had the potential to do better.

After much soul searching, I abandoned my first story and began a new project. Lee expertly steered me through the process of outlining the plot of The Twisted Tree and read through an early draft, pointing out where I could improve the story.

When Lee invited me to her seaside writer’s cottage for dinner I was hugely excited but also nervous. I needn’t have worried – she was lovely and we chatted about all kinds of things, including our mutual love of ghost stories.

As we were talking, I noticed what looked like a creepy face in the glass door of the wood burner – and it gave me an idea for my story. Talking about it made us both shiver, and we quickly decided to change the subject – Lee was sleeping there alone that night!

When my taxi arrived several hours late (it’s a long story, the first one got stuck in mud), Lee kindly walked me up to the main road. The night sky was alive with stars – and as we hugged goodbye, I thanked every one of them for bringing us together.